Let’s face it: homes today are needy and expensive. Most folks don’t realize this at first. After all, when you buy a home, a lot of money and investment gets put down and then there’s the expectation that everything will last for a long time. However, homes are like anything else, needing maintenance, care, and upkeep. And the older a home grows, the more the maintenance and repair list grows.
Cost of Repairs
Of course, some items just happen as the big systems on a home age. HVAC systems, for example, will start to go out somewhere between 8 and 12 years. A typical failure tends to be the blower unit for the furnace, which is essential to push warm air through the house. An HVAC replacement can easily hit between $10,000 to $15,000 alone.
Foundation repairs are usually under carpet, which doesn’t cost much to pull back and reinstall. However, the foundation work itself can be a pretty penny. On average, a house foundation cost repair can run as much as $8,000. Your carpet or hardwood floor is just as much a victim as your wallet in these cases.
A plumbing failure can be extremely expensive. Not only does water cause a significant amount of damage that needs to be mitigated, but plumbing replacement oftentimes needs to be upgraded to the current code. And that means re-plumbing can be in the thousands of dollars, also requiring finishing work as well. It’s quite possible for a plumbing failure and repair to cost as much as $20,000 to $25,000 for a home today.
Irrigation problems are very common after about a decade. While these projects seem to be do-it-yourself work, trying to repair a flooding pipe in the middle of cold December isn’t fun at all. And whatever people think the cost will end up being double due to mistakes from lack of working on irrigation every day.
If you have pets, your house will take a beating as well. A cat, for example, can do serious damage to flooring and walls just from urinating when stressed. The results can easily be something near $5,000 in new flooring work alone, even with carpeting. Hardwood floors cost much more.
There is an Alternative
On the other hand, if you’re not inclined to want to deal with home repair or maintenance anymore, especially with older homes where the cost of repair and fixing things goes up exponentially (especially when parts are no longer in production or available anymore), then log cabin kits offer a viable option. The fact is, that modern log cabin kits come complete with modern components. Once assembled, the quality of the product is amazing and on par with new housing (in some cases even better). Even more interesting, log cabin kits can be installed anywhere there is a viable foundation pad. Given the frustration that easily comes with an old home beginning to fail, switching to a log cabin can be a welcome relief, and put you in charge of your own destiny with a brand new, built-for-you structure.